A troubled paradise

There’s a theory that great individuals drive human events. Larger-than-life figures appear, seize the moment and shape history, for better or worse.

In our case, the shaping of history has taken a turn for the worse. By the end of this year, the devastation of negligence, insensitivity, arrogance and mediocrity in leadership would have leveled these islands far worse than the destruction of World War II. It’ll creep into our lives like a thief in the wee hours of the morning.

In football parlance, the person at the helm is the quarterback, who is supposedly most equipped with foresight and tact to read situations before calling the next play. Obviously, our quarterback has called strange plays as to even confuse his team of their goal post. When the ball is snapped, they headed in the exact opposite direction.

As a result, the CNMI is bankrupt and reportedly spends more than what it collects today. Politics aside, all must buckle down to answering the single most important question once asked of voters by the revered late President Ronald Reagan: “Are you better off today than four years ago?” Answers from employees in the private sector who had to endure furlough or work-hour reduction would be negative. A loud shout of “No Mas” is still reverberating throughout this archipelago. They are not ready to surrender to mediocre leadership and not when they had to work extra jobs to make up for wage losses.

For those pondering eventual joblessness in the near term, it’s a mind-numbing issue for heads of households. I liken it to the calm before the storm. I’m sure they’ve spread bank passbooks on the dinner table trying to figure out how to avoid foreclosure on the first family home.

The jobless quiz whether life in the deadly sea of welfare dependency is the ultimate trophy of crushing poverty right here at home. They are struggling to retain their individual dignity, dreading the end of the month when they must line up for food stamp coupons. Joblessness translates into hopelessness and I am sure this administration did nothing but push them deeper into the abyss of crushing poverty. So much for “Making It Happen!”

I am praying that the consistent increases in food stamp recipients isn’t a message trumpeting the future of our children in this troubled paradise. Comes with poor economic conditions are grave social problems from illegitimacy, substance abuse, child abuse and even abuses for all abuses.

This is the state of the CNMI today and I am sure that taxpayers would heartily agree. Various ploys, including the governor’s education initiative, La Fiasco Mall, and fuel surcharge, aren’t going to sway voters to repeat hard-earned lessons of the last four years.

Finally, this administration’s so-called education initiative is far from being inclusive, though grandly exclusive. Why is it that only Southern High School received computer laptops? What about the rest of our young scholars in junior and senior high schools on Rota, Tinian and Saipan? Revenue generation loss rendered this initiative a half-cocked concoction. It still is the economy, lai, di ba? Otherwise, it would in fact be an inclusive policy, right?

Realistically, this administration’s legacy would have to be “A Troubled Paradise” as a direct result of its own mediocre leadership. No Mas!

John S. DelRosario Jr.
Koblerville